COMPENSATION FOR HOUSING DESTROYED BY RUSSIA: WHAT WE KNOW

Oleksandra FEDOTOVA, attorney, partner ADER HABER

Russia continues to shell peaceful Ukrainian cities with rockets, hitting civil objects, namely residential buildings. It is useful to know step-by-step algorithm to obtain compensation for destroyed housing from state.

Damages are documented in stages. First stage – SSES has to confirm the event.

Second stage – property owner has to submit a statement about criminal offence and a notice about destroyed property to law enforcement authorities. It can be done in several ways:

• By means of ingle State E-Services Web Portal Diia;
• By using Diia web application;
• Via Center of administrative services;
• By notary.

Except an owner, the notice can be submitted by:

• Construction customers (for objects that are not commissioned yet);
• Investors (for objects that are not commissioned yet);
• Members of housing cooperative (in case if premises are bought, but ownership right has not been executed yet);
• Asset holders;
• Inheritors (successors) of named persons.

If an object is in common property the notice is submitted by:

For common partial ownership (each person owns a defined part in ownership)

• If a notice is submitted via Diia Portal – a notice is submitted by each owner personally;
• If a notice is submitted via notary or Centre of administrative services – it can be submitted by owners jointly;

For joint ownership (usually, joint property of spouses)

• a notice can be submitted by one of co-owners.

A person who is registered in an apartment or in a house or tenant (even if a tenant is an asset holder), can’t submit such a notice.

A notice can be submitted irrespective of a person’s location, and it is considered to be received in a date of its submission. The person who has submitted a notice receives information about its registration automatically through the Diia portal. If the notice is submitted online, it is not necessary to submit it offline. There is no difference between offline and online notices.

Third stage is a damage assessment which must be uploaded to the Unified database of assessment reports. The executive committee must create a commission and organize an examination, which is conducted with the involvement of a specialist. Based on the results of assessment a report has to be be prepared, which must be uploaded to the Building Activities Register. However, subject to previous approval of the executive committee, an owner can order an assessment on its own and notify the executive committee on irs results. It should be taken into account that a report has to be compulsory uploaded to the Building Activities Register.

It should be taken into account, that currently there are no special law about damage compensation, so it is impossible to predict whether such a law will require to carry out an assessment by appraisers defined by an executive committee or military administration only. So is not superfluous to сontact an executive committee or military administration to get a clarification.

Unfortunately, it is impossible to assess the damage in those territories where the active hostilities are taking place. Officials promise that such an assessment will be carried out after the end of martial law in the relevant territory. At the same time, by this time, the person must be provided with housing for temporary residence. However, the procedure for providing such housing and the order are not yet provided by legislation.